'Battlestar Galactica' Plan Subject To Change

While the Cylons are planning, the writers behind "Battlestar Galactica" are sometimes playing it by ear, allowing the natural flow of storytelling to help lay out the path that will bring the show to its highly anticipated series finale.

"The truth is, nothing's nailed down until the final episode is written, shot and edited," David Weddle, supervising producer of "Battlestar Galactica" and one of the writers of Friday's Season 4 premiere told SyFy Portal's Michael Hinman. "Everything is always in flux and anything could still happen. That's what makes it such an exciting show to write and to watch."

That doesn't mean there won't be continuity, because the writing team that includes Weddle and partner in crime Bradley Thompson have been utilizing the technique of retroactive continuity, or as fans like to call it, the retcon. Finding a retcon isn't easy because viewers typically don't know what was planned out ahead of time, and what was simply picked up from previous episodes to run with.

Many fans had questioned whether or not the mysterious painting found on the wall of Starbuck's apartment in the second season episode of "Valley of Darkness" that was featured in later episodes was part of the plan all along, or a retcon.

Fans now have their answer.

"The mandala that Kara painted since she was a child and that later showed up in the clouds to lure her to her 'death' was something Brad and I went back and discovered when we were writing 'Rapture,'" Weddle said. Executive Producer Ronald D. Moore "wanter her to see something on the Temple of Five on the algae planet that would relate to a larger destiny, something that no one else would recognize. We went back and screened the scenes from 'Valley of Darkness' and noticed the mandala that she had painted on her apartment wall. That gave us the idea to put it on the temple and to build it into her backstory in 'Maelstrom.'"

None of the story surrounding the mandala was planned out ahead of time, Weddle said. In spite of that, they were able to develop a strong story, and find ways to link different aspects of the series together, and the same will happen with "Maelstrom," and how that will affect Starbuck's final journey in the fourth season.

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